Haute Autorité pour la transparence de la vie publique


The Haute Autorité pour la transparence de la vie publique is an independent French administrative authority created by the law on transparency of public affairs on October 11th, 2013. It replaced the Commission pour la transparence financière de la vie politique. The HATVP is responsible for ascertaining and preventing potential conflicts of interest among French public servants.

History

Until 1989, the investigation and application of ethical problems, which included conflicts of interest or chronicles, were included in criminal proceedings, but had no special laws or authority to deal with such affairs until the Luchaire Affair that took place between 1982 and 1986. During the tenure of Charles Hernu, France supplied shells to Iran. The newspaper La Presse de la Manche and a report of the Contrôle général des armées published by L'Express in January 1987 revealed that end-user certificates were falsified to show destinations other than Iran, as the country was under an arms embargo at the time.
After this scandal, the first "transparency of public life" law was passed; it defined the state funding of political parties and mandated some public servants to publish their financial status. However, this law was very vague and unclear in some aspects.
In 1994, a parliamentary working group led by Philippe Séguin made 18 proposals including the limitation of election expenses, the reformation of the status of political parties, and the extension of the mandatory declaration of status to more categories of public servants.
On 14 January 2020, the High Authority received three delegates from the European Commission.
On April 10th, 2013, after the Cahuzac affair, the HATVP was created.

Missions

The main missions of the HATVP are:
The HATVP is composed of: